The Rationality of Irrationality in Galcon

One of my favourite games is Galcon by Phil Hassey, an incredibly simple little strategy game that’s grown in popularity and been ported to a ridiculous number of platforms. What I love about it is that despite the simplicity of its mechanics, the game has an incredible amount of strategic depth by virtue of the human element.

For those unfamiliar with the game, the setup is very straightforward. You own planets, the size of which determine the number of ships they produce each second. You can’t see the number of ships on an enemy planet, but can usually guess from their production rate and their troop movements. Ships accumulate on planets, and can be sent to other planets. When they reach a friendly planet, they’re added to the local reserves. When they reach an enemy planet, they sacrifice themselves at a 1:1 ratio with enemy ships until there are no more opposing vessels, at which point you own the planet (and its production). Neutral planets spawn at the start of the game with ships on them, but do not produce new ships until a player takes them out. The objective is to be the only person with planets at the end of the game.

Thats it. There’s nothing else, no unit types, planet types, and few subtle nuances. It’s the simplest computer strategy game I’ve ever played. Yet that simplicity can translate into a lot of strategic and tactical depth in a multiplayer game. While a 1vs1 is generally speaking just a contest of math, reflexes, and calculated gambles, Galcon really begins to shine in free for alls with 3 players or more. Mind games, bluffing, backstabbing, and guessing the intentions of other players are the skills brought to the forefront. In other words, it’s a game so simple that the majority of the gameplay can be derived from the human elements instead of the mechanics themselves.

The best gameplay emerges when players have the mindset of rational, self-interested parties who are looking for the big prize: to be the last man standing. While this can often turn to a stalemate situation (being the first one to move in a four way stalemate can result in you being torn apart by the guy opposite from the one you’re attacking) there are a lot of mind games, fake-outs, and alliances of questionable authenticity. When irrational players enter the game, sometimes the results are game-breaking (for instance, out-of-game alliances between friends, or a grudge held between matches that results in another player rushing someone at match start to grief them, sacrificing their own chances to screw that player over). However, in most cases, they just play into the hands of the people who can recognize their irrational behaviour. If someone is holding on to ground that they’d be better off ceding to a bigger power, both them and the person attacking them will suffer losses that you can exploit. Likewise, if they lock themselves into a conflict with the second strongest player the big guy just sits back and waits for them both to exhaust themselves. An irrational player can taken advantage of by taking advantage of what is usually a fairly predictable mindset.

Yet there’s an interesting interplay, in which an otherwise rational player might engage in seemingly irrational behaviour by design. A common survival technique when you’re the small player in the scene (and therefore, anyone with half a mind could take you out wholesale) is to bunker down and make yourself too costly to take by massing up troops and ensuring not to waste them on attacks that won’t pay themselves back. The intent, ostensibly, is to defend their small territory to the death. Yet, if an attack comes, defending that ground to the last man will result in your force obliterated as well as losing your planets, ending the game. You would expect that a rational player, therefore, would be bluffing in this instance, and if a sufficiently large attack comes, they’ll simply give up their planets and run away to preserve their fleets. Their posturing is a non-credible threat. Indeed, this is often the case, and players faced with overwhelming force or an alliance of enemies will often retreat.

Yet you’ll also find experienced players digging in, meeting every attack, and ceding no ground… even going on the offensive against a superior foe once attacked! New players often do this simply out of stubbornness and loss aversion, but experienced players are instead employing suicidal behaviour intentionally. Why in the world would a rational player employ behaviour that will likely cost them the game?

Well, it’s not so insane as it first appears. If a player digs in under a sustained attack, other parties will be watching and waiting on the wings. They know that taking your worlds will weaken the aggressor, and will be eager to capitalize on it. This is even more true if the defender takes the fight to the enemy and starts cutting into their least defended planets, forcing the aggressor to fight fires when his forces are out of position, usually resulting in a massive over-correction. It’s a calculated gamble… will the other players intervene soon enough that I can come out ahead, or will I have taken too much damage (or even been destroyed) by the time they sense the opportunity? There is a small, albiet significant chance that an aggressive defensive posture can pay off.

Sometimes it works, and you can end up with a large production base and still have most of your army. Sometimes it doesn’t. Like I said, it’s a gamble.

Yet, another part of this is the metagame. Galcon matches are rarely played in isolation… instead, they’re often played in sequence against the same players, due to the length of a typical match. Making a suicidal play might cost you this game, but in future games your opponents will be more wary about attempting to take your worlds, fearing that the losses incurred gaining your worlds will make them vulnerable. It sends a message to your opponents: you might be able to overwhelm me, but I’ll be sure to take you with me if I can. Likewise, fleeing at the first sign of overwhelming force might be a good move this game, but your opponents will take note of that behaviour and play more aggressively to take advantage of it.

This is why I love Galcon. It’s a game that is not about its mechanics, but about its players.